AsianScientist (Sep. 12, 2016) – Japanese researchers have developed an in vivo imaging method to observe mechanoreceptors in living skin, which may allow for the long-term study of aging-related neurodegeneration. The paper was published in IEEE Transactions on Haptics.
Previous studies only described the morphology and physiological functions of mechanoreceptor Meissner’s corpuscles (MCs) in cut sections of fixed tissues, and did not identify the mechanism of their signal transduction in living tissue.
A research team led by Dr. Akihito Sano of the Nagoya Institute of Technology-Nagoya University (NITech-NU) used a fluorescent-based technique called two-photon microscopy, which allows the imaging of living tissue, up to a depth of one millimeter, with high resolution and low phototoxicity. By adding a nontoxic and long-lived fluorescent lipophilic dye, they were to observe the activity of MCs in the fingertips of live mice over an extended time period.
“Our newly developed in vivo imaging method makes it possible, for the first time, to longitudinally track structural changes in human MCs for the diagnosis of neural diseases, and for the study of aging,” said Dr. Takaki Miyata, a senior scientist at Nagoya University and co-author of the study.
Human MCs decline in density with normal aging, and studies have reported changes in the shape, size and density of MCs in a number of neural diseases, such as peripheral neuropathies. The ability to observe the MCs in vivo over extended periods of time, without toxicity or physical damage, has applications to human health, the researchers say.
The article can be found at: Pham et al. (2016) Two-photon Imaging of DiO-labelled Meissner Corpuscle in Living Mouse’s Fingertip.
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Source: Nagoya Institute of Technology.
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